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Cuito fire, June 2026 Cuito, Chinguar

Out · last detection 20 Jun 2026, 12:14 UTC

The fire started on 4 June 2026 in Cuito, Angola, and satellites saw it burning for 16 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 8,548 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 24th largest in Bié since 2016 (of 64 with a page). Number 198 in Angola in 2026, of 486.

Burnt area
8,548ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
16days
4 Jun 2026 – 19 Jun 2026
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
4 Jun
2026
Heat detections
288
in a single hotspot: 92 MW
Danger at start
24
High · FWI index
Energy released
3.0GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

20 Jun 2026
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 4 Jun19 Jun

How it evolved, day by day

467891011121314151617181920

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

26°high
49km/h · peak gust
21%lowest humidity

It had gone 22 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

75% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,700 ha in 2016, 863 ha in 2017, 2,137 ha in 2018, 1,486 ha in 2019, 1,799 ha in 2020, 1,585 ha in 2021, 1,043 ha in 2022. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 6,451 ha that had burned before.

What happened to each town

  1. Cuito where it started
    5,730 ha reached on 28 May
    1.2 %
  2. Chinguar
    2,867 ha reached on 28 May
    1.0 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
4 Jun 26.0 °C 30 % 19 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
5 Jun 26.2 °C 32 % 18 km/h 0.0 mm High 24
6 Jun 26.5 °C 30 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 26
7 Jun 25.9 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
8 Jun 25.3 °C 25 % 38 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
9 Jun 25.5 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
10 Jun 25.7 °C 21 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
11 Jun 25.4 °C 27 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
12 Jun 24.7 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
13 Jun 23.1 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
14 Jun 22.7 °C 26 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
15 Jun 25.0 °C 22 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
16 Jun 26.3 °C 24 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Jun 26.4 °C 25 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
18 Jun 25.6 °C 30 % 37 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
19 Jun 25.0 °C 26 % 49 km/h 0.0 mm Very high 41
20 Jun after 25.8 °C 28 % 25 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
21 Jun after 25.1 °C 34 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
22 Jun after 24.7 °C 36 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
23 Jun after 24.9 °C 32 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 29
24 Jun after 25.2 °C 30 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
25 Jun after 24.6 °C 30 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
26 Jun after 25.0 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
27 Jun after 25.1 °C 29 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
28 Jun after 25.6 °C 26 % 24 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
29 Jun after 25.0 °C 28 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 32

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 28 May 2026
After · 26 Jun 2026

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

The smoke

CAMS · Copernicus

On 17 June 2026 the air beside the fire reached 41 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 27: 1.8 times the WHO daily guideline (15).

PM2.5 peak41 µg/m³
Days over the guideline8 days
PM1042 µg/m³
Optical depth0.53
2345678910111213141516171819202122
Good Fair Moderate Poor Very poor Extremely poor

Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)

Detections table · 288Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Cuito fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 4 June 2026 and 19 June 2026: 16 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 8,548 hectares (85.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: Cuito (5,730 ha, 1.2 %); Chinguar (2,867 ha, 1.0 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 26.5 °C, humidity dropped to 21 % and gusts hit 49 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 41, class Very high.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Angola (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.